What a Week

It has been an eventful week!!  First of all, the kids have been home from school since Wednesday thanks to "inclement weather," and obviously our Five Days of Valentine have started as well, but the most surreal happenings of the week involve Ethan and Isaac.  In less than 48 hours, I have both registered my baby for kindergarten in the fall AND celebrated with my oldest after he got an acceptance email from BYU this evening!!!  

Ethan is SOOOOO excited and I can't blame him!  He has worked so hard these last four years, overcoming the challenge of moving to another state mid-high-school, and knocking it out of the ballpark with his AP classes, and I just couldn't be prouder.  Adding to the excitement is that his cousins Hannah and Joseph ALSO got in, and they'll all be out there together this fall.  It's going to be so fun living vicariously through Ethan.  Hahahaha.

(I got this sweet text earlier in the week from Ethan's advisor, who sent in letters of recommendation for his college applications -- "Ethan is seriously THE BEST kid!  He is tutoring one of my students, someone he doesn't even know, with patience and kindness.  He is always willing to lend a helping hand.  I don't know if you know this, but his BYU application limited me to 250 words, and I was so disappointed!  I have so many good things I wanted to say about him.  Just wanted you to know.  :)"  It's always heart-warming to know that someone else thinks your kid is as great as you think they are.)

Isaac, meanwhile, doesn't really care all that much about being registered for kindergarten.  Hahahaha.  I, however,  am SO excited for him.  Hahaha.  Especially since kindergarten is full-day here -- which I think is great since he'll be one of the older kids in his grade thanks to having a November birthday.  One thing that I do think he is excited about these days is his newfound ability to sound out words.  In just the last couple of weeks, he has taken greater interest in learning how to read and is quite pleased with himself whenever he is able to recognize words in his books at bedtime.  It's always so magical when letters and sounds and words all come together and suddenly "click" in a child's mind, and I love it!  

Other than that, we've had a nice and lazy last few days with no school {even though they all had some virtual work to do}, and I know they're looking forward to the alleged snow dump we're supposed to have sometime this weekend.  Chances are looking likely that they'll have more "inclement weather days" next week as well, but at least for Monday, we'll have a true holiday with no work for ANYONE thanks to President's Day!

(I kicked off the 5 Days of Valentine with a tube of mini m&ms for each of the kids.  Poor Alex managed to drop his and spill the entire tube almost immediately after opening it while riding around on his hoverboard that morning, but luckily for him, I took pity and got him some more.)

(For Day 2, I made sugar cookies -- which are such a pain to make and ALWAYS a labor of love -- but I kind of forgot to set a timer after putting them in the oven and they all got a little over-baked.  Or a lot over-baked as the case may be.  Hahaha.  It didn't deter anyone from eating them, though, so we'll still call it a win.)

And with that, I bid you goodnight and have a pleasant weekend.  :)